Nyaya Theory of Knowledge

SR No.: 011115
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S C Chateerjee
Publisher: University of Calcutta
Publication Year: 1939
Total Pages: 440
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 38 MB

Page 416

OTHER SOURCES OF KNOWLEDGE
399
arthāpatti may possibly be reduced. The Advaita Vedāntins lose their case against those who prove that vyatıreki is a genuine type of inference, or reduce arthāpatti to some other kind of inference like the hypothetical-categorical or the disjunctive-categorical syllogism. The real reason is, as the Bhāttas point out, that arthāpatti cannot be reduced to any kind of inference. The fundamental condition of all inference is the relation of vyāptı or invariable concomitance between the major and the middle term. In every inference the conclusion follows from a universal proposition which is the result of a previous induction. The knowledge of the universal proposition is derived from the uncontradicted experience of agreement in presence or in absence between the iniddle and the major term. In any inference we apply a universal proposition, which is already known, to a particular case. To reduce arthāpattı to inference we must, therefore, show that here our knowledge of the unobserved fact follows from a universal proposition which is already known by induction. The Naiyāyikas and others would say that the knowledge given by arthāpattı does follou from certain universal propositions. That Devadatta eats at night follows from the universal proposition, “A man who does not cat at night wbile fasting by day is not fat." Similarly, the fact that he is out follows from the proposition, “A living man is either at home or out of 1t” But these propositions are not cases of real vyāptı or induction. They are not generalisations from the particular facts of experience The universal proposition, “Wherever there is smoke there is fire,” is derived from the particular instances of their coexistence. So also, the proposition, " Wherever there is no fire there is no smoke." is derived from the particular instances of their agreement in absence. But we have no previous experiences of the agreement in absence between eating at night' and fatness. We have previous experiences of the concomitance